Trick came back with all the items on the list in record time. Lyla added her items and they presented the basket to the dais. There were already baskets up there, so they weren’t first, but it didn’t matter. Prizes weren’t awarded until the end of the night and she had no intentions of still being here when the night came to a close.
The host dismissed them and took the basket away. Lyla heard Trick inhale as he turned to her, but she wasn’t waiting to hear him. Instead, she went to the bar.
Ivan had been a good help during the scavenger hunt. For one thing, he was taller than her, and he was good for getting other people out of the way when she was reaching for the same thing they were.
Lifting herself onto a stool at the bar, she waited for the bartender to come over. “Just a lemonade, please,” she said.
“Sure thing, Mrs. Strickland,” the bartender said and she exhaled.
That name was going to take a long time to go away. The sad thing was, she’d never actually changed her name anywhere officially. It had never been brought up that she should, which she guessed worked out well on reflection.
“So, I think you should wear a toga.”
Rolling her eyes, the sound of Trick’s voice was enough to set her on edge. “Excuse me?”
“At the wedding,” he said. “I figure instead of having our honeymoon in Greece, we should do the full shebang and have a wedding too.” He leaned in so close that she tensed and raised her shoulder, trying to keep him away. “And you’d rock a toga, baby… I’d just have to deal with having a hard-on all day in front of our guests.”
“Mm hmm,” she said.
The one thing she’d promised herself that she wouldn’t do tonight was engage him. Trick wanted her to react. But Lyla had shut down her emotions now. He wasn’t getting in. No way. She’d needed him and he’d screwed her over. That was it, his one chance.
Done.
“They might do weddings at that Acropolis place; I’ll look into it… I’ll get the guys to come over, make them dress as gladiators or something.”
“Gladiators are roman,” she muttered as the bartender brought her drink. “Togas too, for that matter.”
“Huh,” he said. “So, we move the wedding to Italy or go naked?”
Closing her lips around her straw, Lyla drank and reminded herself not to loosen. “They wore clothes in Ancient Greece, similar to togas, they just weren’t called that.”
“I was thinking about the Olympic thing,” he said. “You said the dudes were naked.”
“Are you planning to take part in an event?” she asked.
“If you want me to,” he said. “We could host our own naked Olympics… We could sell tickets… that would pay for the wedding, and a vacation for everyone… Though they’d have to entertain themselves, ‘cause you know, we’d be at a hotel far away from everyone we know… preferably far away from everyone else on the planet… Do they have a desert out there or something? Somewhere we could camp?”
Turning her eyes to his, she wasn’t impressed. “You think you could survive camping in the desert? Without a cellphone? Without running water?”
He shrugged. “We can take water. As long as I’m alone with you, I don’t need to talk to anyone else and you know more than the internet anyway, so we’re set.”
She couldn’t look at him anymore, so she returned to her drink. “How would you find out the score of the game?” Of whatever game or sport was on at the time, not that she’d have a clue about it.
“Are you kidding?” he asked, leaning closer. “If we’ve just hosted the latest naked Olympics, that’s the only sporting event anyone will be talking about for weeks.” Her lips twitched, she wanted to smile, but picked up her straw with her tongue instead. He got so near to her that she felt his breath on her ear. “I saw that.”
Damn him.
His finger slid onto her knee, but she quickly pulled her legs away. “Don’t,” she murmured.
“I love you, Malloy,” he whispered and leaned in to touch his lips to the side of her neck.
Oh no. Why did he have to kiss her there? His lips were so slow in their caress, so tender and delicate as they tasted their way to her shoulder and around to her collarbone.
His hand slid across her stomach and he eased her body toward his. “Nairn,” she whispered.
“I got you, baby. Oh, sweetheart, I got you,” he murmured and touched his lips to her earlobe.
“You hurt me,” she said, telling herself to pull away but finding herself incapable of moving. “Again. I needed you. You told me you would always be there and I… I needed you.”
“Uh, Trick?”
Sadie’s voice was close by. As soon as she heard it, Lyla pushed at Trick, remembering that she was supposed to be keeping her distance.
He loosened, but didn’t go far. “Say, not now,” Trick said, growling the words through his teeth.
“But… something’s happening, look.”
She was right. The music died and there was a hubbub. When she spun her stool around, Lyla was surprised to see the crowd spreading wide around something… around someone… And cops, why were there cops?
“Damn, is that… Bunny?” Trick asked.
The cops closed in around the sweating man on the dancefloor. He was grabbed and turned around. As cuffs were slapped on his wrists, one of the cops began reciting Miranda.
Another cop turned to the group. “Go back to your party, folks, nothing to see here,” the cop said.
Nothing to see? That was Prem’s network director being slapped into cuffs, and led away. “Oh, God, I wonder what he did,” someone nearby said.
“What didn’t he do?” Sadie said.
“I heard he’s been sleeping with his assistants.”
That wasn’t an arrestable offence as far as Lyla knew. As she turned her stool back to the bar, she saw the Opposites cameraman turning his lens onto the director. Ha, now he knew what it was like. Turning off her microphone from the pack on her back, Lyla unclipped it and tossed it onto the bar.
“I think that’s enough from me,” she said and took a mouthful of her lemonade before she hopped off her stool. “Ivan, can I walk out alone or do you need to escort me home?”
“I can take you home,” Trick said behind her.
In a move that was usually his, she released a single burst of laughter and turned around to pat his cheek once. Oh, he was persistent, and gorgeous, and an idiot… in the best possible way and she loved him.
Losing her father had taught her one valuable lesson: life was short.
“You can call me,” she said. “In twelve days.”
“What’s twelve days?” he asked her and glanced at a smiling Sadie.
“The end of your Opposites contracts,” Sadie said.
“So, once we’re done…” he asked, and it was sort of sweet how the light of hope met his eyes.
Even though there were no cameras around, Lyla cupped her hands around her mouth and skirted her stool to lean in and touch her lips to his.
Trick grabbed her hips and pulled her into the vee of his thighs. She didn’t mind him holding her, but wasn’t going to share the tenderness of this kiss with anyone.
As soon as his tongue tried to find hers, she stepped back out of his arms and reached over the bar to grab her purse. “By the way,” Lyla said, taking a half-step backwards. “Todd and Stacy are going steady… he’s very grateful… you should call him.”
Trick grinned and it made her return the expression as she tiptoed backwards. “I will,” he said.
Half turning away, she kept herself loose as she spun back and this time she paused, though she was six feet away from him now. “Oh, and one more thing…”
“Yeah, baby?”
“The test was wrong,” she said and tried her best not to smile when he lost some of his delight to confusion.
“The test?”
“We’re pregnant,” she said and his jaw sank, Lyla winked at him before spinning away from his stunned expression.
Yep, shocking him was still fun.